Due to the problems discussed in this thread, the SSC forums will be permanently closed to new posts in the coming days. The forums will be replaced by a static HTML archive of them. No new posts will be accepted.

Unfortunately, I do not have the time to maintain the forum. The current forum software is several years out of date. Problems like the one mentioned above will only become more serious as time passes.

The forum is running now only due to temporary software kept on the server for compatibility. This software will be removed in March 2012. So, there is no way to maintain the current situation unless the forum is modified extensively such that it is compatible with PHP 5.3. See the linked to thread for more details.

I could switch to a different forum software, but I do not have the time to do that and I do not have the time to maintain a new forum either. Certainly, newer forum software will have less problems. But as I'd have to be the one to do all of this and I don't have the time to, it won't happen.

If someone has experience with server administration, Linux, PHP, MySQL, etc., and would like to help us switch to a different software, please email me at ben@sscentral.org as soon as possible.

Last edited by SSCBen on Sun Sep 04, 2011 10:09 pm, edited 1 time in total.

This thread was originally in news, but I have now found a good fix for the problems the forum had.

However, this fix probably will not be enough in the long run. Who here knows a good deal about server administration, Linux, PHP, etc.? Please let me know by posting here or by emailing me as I suggested in the original post.

I literally do not have the time to maintain this forum any longer. So I'm thinking that we need to switch to a different forum software and maintain that. This won't be easy but it is probably necessary.

It'll be even worse now as one of the fixes I implemented was turning off error messages. If I didn't do this you'd see a bunch at the top of every page. If you do ever have to fix anything, first go into the .htaccess file for the forums subdomain and comment out everything. Then you can start by Googling the error message.

I don't know enough of anything yet, as most of my work towards MySQL has been fruitless. If we do have to close the forum, it could possibly increase the overall community, as more of the ideas would be centered in one specific location, and the people might tend to be more active if there were more posts.

As much as I'd hate to see these forums go, it would make the most sense if they cannot be maintained. Things have been pointing in this direction for quite a while now. Would it be possible to combine the data rather than archiving it, though? I know that it was discussed once to combine all the old SQL backups lying around into one forum and having SSC's posts remain in usable format on iScF would beat having a static archive (that few would end up reading tbh). I wouldn't imagine that it would be difficult to convert vB tables into phpBB ones.

Mess With the Best, Get Soaked Like the Rest!

2004 Red Sox - World Series Champions2007 Red Sox - World Series Champions!

If possible, I'm still hoping for the SSC Forums to remain fully functional and available to the membership here. If that ends up not being possible, while I'm totally open to trying to import content to iSn, I have yet to find a good means to doing so. So far, I can find conversion utilities and such for moving a vB board to phpbb, but not for bringing in additional users/threads into an existing board. This is a non-trivial problem, especially since there would be many overlapping user names between SSC and iSn.

I was thinking that the board could be converted and then the tables containing the content could be merged with the existing ones at iScN since they'd both be in the right format. If it can be done with a single post and a single user, it can be done with a whole board since we just want the users, topics, and posts. The main problem would be the sheer size of SSC. I know that users can be merged because it's been done to me. The names that overlap, but are different people, would have to be renamed before converting.

Of course, if the board can be converted, it might just be worthwhile running it like that in the first place.

Mess With the Best, Get Soaked Like the Rest!

2004 Red Sox - World Series Champions2007 Red Sox - World Series Champions!

Help/scripts would definitely be needed for merging two phpbb forums. Even assuming all SSC member accounts were renamed (e.g. adding a prefix like "SSC"), one would need to do manual merging of user accounts and, as far as I've found so far, there are no official scripts that support that feature yet (though there appear to be some homebrew scripts). Then again, I suppose only active members would need/desire to have their accounts merged. Of course, assuming an import is successful, that means the threads would be available for replying in even if accounts were not merged.

All that said, I'd still prefer that the SSC forums remain running and hopefully someone or some others will be willing and able to help Ben out with maintaining these forums from the technical side. SSC has a unique vibe that many people like and I wouldn't want that lost if possible. As I noted above, if these forums were converted to phpbb, I'd be willing to help out with troubleshooting technical problems. What I don't want to do here is affect the true essence of this board.

405th.com runs on vBulletin and is working 97% of the time. Maybe I could PM a mod or Adam the Community Admin for help. I could also start a thread there, asking for help but it might not get a lot of attention because I can only start threads in the Noob Forum.

Sorry if I'm not active much, busy on another forum and another project non-soaker related.

We run vBulletin 3.5. They run vBulletin 4, which was a complete rewrite as far as I know. I don't think 4 has the problems we're experiencing. So thanks for thinking about it, but they probably don't know anything that'll help.